Some research results have been released today about the attitudes of Americans in regards to video games. The poll was conducted by Hill & Knowlton and sadly the only results they published on their website are the ones that go along with the opinion that games are generally negative. The results they mention are that 60% of adults believe that the government should regulate the sales of violent or mature content video games, while 51% believe that the government should regulate the content itself. According to the ESA there’s a lot more pertinent information that they’re not bothering to mention, as the group approached the ESA with the results of this study the previous summer. The study found that more than two thirds of Americans aged 18-34 currently play video games, less than 20% of Americans believe that playing video games is a negative way to spend time with friends and family and more than half of families think video games are a positive way to spend time together.

While I have no issue with the idea of regulations imposed upon sales of mature-rated games including making selling mature-rated games to minors a crime I feel strongly that the government has no place stepping in and telling video game companies what they can and cannot put into their games. Movie companies get away with releasing ‘unrated editions’ of various films onto DVD which presumably would have gotten a sterner rating than an “R”. It’s a simple matter of freedom of speech and expression. If I have to bring two forms of ID to my neighborhood video game store when I want to pick up the next Resident Evil title I’ll live with it, just as long as the game is every bit as viscerally horrifying as it was meant to be.